I'm Back!

I apologize for disappearing. Things have just been up and down and busy since I found out about the baby. I have so many appointments and doctors to see it's mind boggling. I carry a binder with me whenever I leave the house now because I forget things. Some of the websites call it "pregnancy brain" I call it busy mommy syndrome. 


So Dr. D, the endocrinologist confirmed that I do have Vitamin D deficiency. He started me on Vitamin D pills (vitamins, duh) once a day. He wanted to treat me more aggressively but he can't because of the little bean in my uterus. I've been on them for about two weeks now, and feel no changes in the numbness in my hands.


A lot of my other symptoms have resolved, and before I started the Vitamin D. This makes me wonder what was going on. I think it may be possible that IF it is MS, then I had a flare up of symptoms and it is over. Just because my thyroid is messed up, and my vitamin D level is messed up, doesn't mean I am going to stop pursuing what is wrong with me. I fully intend to keep on after my doctor's. If this means I have to wait for the symptoms to return, or to demand an MRI after the baby is born, I am content with that. 


Once I make some phone calls later this afternoon, I will be under the care of six different physicians. If one of them can figure out what is wrong with my body, I will be happy. I'll be seeing my primary care doc, fetal-maternal medicine doc (for high risk pregnancies), my regular OBGYN,  my endocrinologist, my cardiologist, and soon my hematologist. The worst part about having all these appointments is not having a car. I spend a lot of time walking to bus stops, riding the bus, then waiting for the bus after my appointment. 


That's life. Maybe one day we will be able to afford a car. I consider us blessed that I can afford to ride the bus and don't have to walk everywhere that I have to go. The one good thing about the bus rides and waiting at bus stops is that with my binder in hand, I always keep extra paper so I can jot down notes on the new book(s?).


I only have three chapters down but it's my goal to have at least three more done by Friday. The book isn't going to write itself. I intend to post more here as well. It's therapeutic for me in a way. I can get out a lot of my thoughts without burdening my friends with a book length conversation.


The other things going on with me are emotional. I stopped my antidepressant, due to being pregnant, and that combined with hormones have been making me extra emotional at times. My mood swings are horrendous. Some days, EVERY little thing angers me. Other days, I spend a lot of time crying over stupid things. Some such things being some of my friends.


It has come to my attention that some of my friends and I are not as close as we used to be. Because I have a child, and another on the way, I can't hang out and party like I used to be able to. This has affected some of my friendships. Lately I find myself angered that I am not invited to a party or a get together. I want to rage at them that just because I can't drink doesn't mean that I can't hang out and have a good time.


One night I was feeling particularly down so I started posting some of my feelings on Facebook. I didn't name any names, I just made several comments about how I was feeling and how I was being treated by certain people. Several of my friends called or texted just to see what was up. The ones that I was really looking forward to hearing from never contacted me. I guess that is all the proof I need that it is time to let them go.


It hurts because these are people that I considered to be part of my family. I guess it's true what they say, people come in your life for a certain amount of time. You learn from them and then at some point some of them move on. Some stay.


I really cherish the ones that have stayed. They mean way more to me than they will ever know.

Friendship

I was wondering if anyone else has gone through the same types of things with their friends that I do with mine. Do you ever have friends who treat you like you are a friend of convenience? For example, when their lives aren't going as perfectly as they would like you hear from them every single day. Phone calls, texts, emails, and IMs, all to talk about their problems.


Of course you sit and listen because that is what friends do. You offer advice. You tell them about your own experiences with a similar situation. Then things start going well for your friend and they just disappear. The phone calls, texts, etc. just drop off until they dwindle into nothing. Your texts or calls to them go un-returned. Finally you give up trying, but then the next crisis pops up in their life and they are right back being your best friend. What do you do in this situation? Go ahead and act like nothing is wrong? 


Then there are your friends who are your best buddy when they are single, but then when they get a man (or a woman, I have had male friends do this as well) in their lives, it suddenly becomes all about their significant other. I know how it feels to be involved in that all consuming love, especially at the beginning, but do you drop your friends because of it? You may not hear anything from this person for weeks or months at a time, but let them have a fight with their significant other and you are their best buddy again.


I am not the type of person who needs their friends up their ass 24/7. I understand everyone has their own life and their own things going on. I just don't appreciate being told that I am like family to them, and then they just drop out of my life for months at a time or avoid me. If I am taking the time to text you or email you or even dropping you a message on Facebook to ask how you are doing, the least you can do is reply. Don't only contact me when your life is going to shit or you simply want something from me. That is not a friendship.


Have any of you readers gone through something similar? How did you handle it? Suggestions and advice are appreciated. I like all comments-good, bad, or ugly.

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Health Update: I saw Dr. SG yesterday. My chest x-ray showed no pneumonia but showed pulmonary hypertension. I am already being treated for that by my cardiologist. She still thinks all my other problems are my thyroid. Rather than getting upset about it, or crying about it, or having my head explode in frustration, I have decided to just be patient. I am already scheduled to see the endocrinologist on May 9th, which is a little over two weeks away. I am going to see what he has to say and go from there. I am going to do my best to not stress myself out until there is something definite to stress about.

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Writing Update: I have my character names picked out, and I did a little work on some character back story. I needed to understand why certain characters had such and intense hatred for each other and now that I got it figured out, I can start writing the book. Such a simple thing was holding me back from getting started. I'm relieved I figured it out.

As I said, comments are always welcome.

It's MY blog and I'll whine if I want to

I took a few days off from blogging because I felt like I was whining too much. Then I really thought about it and you know what? It's MY blog and if I want to whine I will whine. People don't have to read it.


I feel like some people get offended when they ask how I am feeling and I tell them that I feel like crap. I try to be positive. I try not to complain about how tired I am or how lousy I feel. There are just some days that I don't feel like plastering a smile on my face and saying I am fine when I am not.


The weather is getting warmer here and it's affecting how I am feeling. If I get too warm, my fatigue level goes through the roof. My hands feel more uncoordinated. My arms and legs feel heavy. It affects my concentration as well. 


I tried so hard to go without putting the air conditioning on today. I made it to 6:30pm before I gave in and turned it on. I just couldn't seem to catch my breath. I put my head down on my desk for a second and promptly fell asleep. Luckily it was less than five minutes. 


I think the shower I took last night was too hot as well. My arms were ultra heavy, and this time around I had jelly legs. When I finished I had to sit on the edge of the tub to catch my breath. I got out of the bathroom into the cool living room and chugged down some cold iced tea. 


I am so tired of this. I just want to be normal again.


I see the doctor again on Monday for a follow up of my chest x-ray. (See previous entry...the follow up makes no sense.) I am bringing in a list of my symptoms that these doctors are going to scan into my chart. Maybe seeing the list in black and white will make them finally listen to me.

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I got the outline done for my new book. Once I get my character names and a mini family tree sorted out, I will be ready to write. It should have already been done, but as I said above, my concentration and focus have been shot the past couple of days.

It's pouring down rain outside and the temperature has already dropped so hopefully tomorrow I will be comfortable and able to concentrate. I will be extremely happy to get started. Maybe it can distract me from everything else.

"Writing is the best way to talk without being interrupted." ~ Jules Renard

Tired But Inspired

I had an appointment on Thursday with one of my primary care doctors. I saw Dr. SG this time around. First, I got some antibiotics and a chest x-ray for my cough. I don't have pneumonia or anything so that was a good thing. 


I tried to discuss my numbness problems with her but she didn't seem to want to hear what I had to say. She said that her opinion is to stay on the medication for a while longer, despite the fact that she confirmed that it only takes 4-6 weeks to get into your system. (Yesterday was five weeks.) I really don't believe that in one more week everything is going to mysteriously just go away.


I told her that based upon all of the research I have done my symptoms are spot on with MS. The look on her face was priceless. You would think that I had suddenly sprung three heads. She said,"Well, MS is VERY hard to diagnose." I told her I knew that from what I had read. I told her that I know that we have to rule out other things along the way. She just smiled at me like I was a child and said, "I think you should stay on the medication for a bit longer. It's not like MS is an emergency diagnosis. If you do have it, it is not going to go away."


Sure, it is not an emergency to her, but she doesn't live with what I do everyday. She didn't almost drop four or five eggs while dying them with her daughter because her grip is bad because of the numbness in her hands. She isn't afraid to take a shower while her fiance isn't home, just in case she gets weak from the heat and falls down in the bathroom. She doesn't have to shower with the door unlocked. She doesn't have to worry that if she takes her daughter to the park on a warm day that she will get too weak to walk home.


She wants me to follow up in regards to my cough in 1-2 weeks. A cough. A cough is the least of my worries and if it isn't gone in a week I am surely not going to wait two to be seen.


I think the best thing to do at this point is to call tomorrow and make an appointment with Dr. SH. At the very least, he listened to what I had to say, noted everything in my chart, and didn't make me feel stupid. She didn't write down any of my new symptoms.


On a slightly brighter note, I lost five pounds in a month. I am on the right track in that department at least.

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I found a song last night that just opened up the flood gates of inspiration. I played it over and over and the ideas just flowed out of me. I love that music can do that for me. 

I am used to writing thriller/mystery type stories but this idea will be a young adult book. It has the possibility to be three books if I write it the right way. I am a little nervous about writing a young adult book as I know there are several things I have to tone down. The profanity for one. I have such a potty mouth sometimes and it sometimes leaks into my writing. 

Luckily I have my friend Stayc who has volunteered to be my test subject on this book (books?). She is amazing when it comes to pointing out things that I might have missed and even some grammar mistakes and spelling. She also isn't afraid to tell me when something isn't believable or if a character seems a little flat. I love that I can trust her to tell me the truth and not sugarcoat it just cause she doesn't want to hurt my feelings.

I am almost finished my outline. I am off to play my song a few more times, get the outline done, and possibly start the first chapter. I am really excited and inspired.

Happy Easter!

One Step Closer

I find the answers aren't so clear

Wish I could find a way to disappear

All these thoughts they make no sense

I find bliss in ignorance

Nothing seems to go away

Over and over again

~~"One Step Closer" by Linkin Park

I didn't post anything yesterday cause I felt so crappy. My arms were more than numb yesterday, they were actually achy.

Every morning when I wake up I lay there thinking, "Will I feel normal today? Will the numbness be gone today?" It is never gone. It is always there. I have forgotten what normal feels like. The only thing that has gotten better is the pain in my eye. It's still blurry but not that painful anymore.

You women know when you are in the shower and you lift up your leg to shave it or wash it and set your foot on the edge of the tub? I can't do that with my right leg anymore. I braved taking a shower last night while home by myself (well with Sabrina). I left the door open and the cell phone on top of the lowered toilet lid just in case. Of course the heat of the hot water made my body numbness worse. In my right hand it was bad to the point that I couldn't feel my pinky at all. Anyway, when I put my leg up on the tub to shave, it got all shaky and almost slipped off tub. Not good. Looks like I will be sitting on the edge of the tub to shave my legs from now on. TMI? Maybe.

As usual, the numbness went back to the "normal" numbness within an hour of getting out of the shower. It's crazy to me that any level of numbness can be considered normal.

The creepy crawly and "wet" sensations continue. Day before yesterday I felt like I had spilled water down my left leg but of course I hadn't. Today I have this crawling bug feeling in my left ankle. I keep having to reach down and rub my skin because I can't get myself to believe it's not a bug.

Tomorrow will be four weeks on the Synthroid and while my thyroid needs to be medicated, it has become clear to me that the thyroid is not the cause of the numbness, fatigue, and blurry vision. If something miraculously doesn't get better over the weekend I am calling the doctor first thing Monday morning for an appointment.

I can't continue like this. Feeling like this for two months with no resolution is wearing on my nerves. It is making me more depressed and anxious and I hate it. It makes me very intolerant of the dumbness of other people. It makes me feel like little things that bother me are HUGE dramatic problems. I know now why some people with chronic illnesses commit suicide, because you just get so tired of feeling so badly.

I would never do that to Bruce, my daughter, my family, and my friends. I am already on an anti-depressant, and plan on asking the doctor for an increase in my dose until all of this gets under control. I cry a lot, mostly when Sabrina is asleep and Bruce is at work or I am in the shower. I just feel so low. I feel like there is no end in sight.

Thanks to all of my friends who check up on me. I appreciate all of the well wishes and prayers. I am trying not to burden everyone with the everyday "poor me" feelings so that's one of the reasons I come here. If I get it all out here, I am not laying it on anyone else.

Come Monday, I will hopefully have an appointment with Dr. H and I can get this taken care of once and for all.

Something New Everyday

Yesterday I was feeling a bit light headed but I didn't pay it any mind because I was sitting down at the time. Later in the evening I was going down the hall to talk to Bruce and almost fell into the wall. A few minutes later I went down the hall to the bedroom to get him a towel for his shower and almost fell again. Luckily I caught myself on the door frame.

I hate this not knowing what is going on with my body. I am so scared that if I do indeed have MS that something will happen with my legs while I am the only one home with Sabrina. Luckily she is a growing girl and not a infant, so I know she can help me get to the phone or something in an emergency.

I only shower now when Bruce is home because the hot water makes the numbness in my arms and face worse. I leave the door unlocked so if anything happens he can get in there to help me. It's scary having to do these things to ensure my safety and that of my daughter.

Tonight, I ate dinner and then fell asleep in the recliner for almost four hours. I am still exhausted. If I hadn't gotten up to play around on Facebook I would probably have went right back to sleep. This is getting frustrating.

As of Saturday I will have been on the Synthroid for 4 weeks. If I don't have any relief to any of my symptoms by then I am calling my doctor on Monday to get an appointment and demanding he start looking at something other than my thyroid. Once I know for sure what is going on with me I can deal with it and the treatment that goes with it.

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The research on my new novel is coming along nicely. I should be able to take the next few days to plot out my characters and outline the plot. I'm still pretty excited about it. It would fulfill a dream to get it published even if it doesn't make a ton of money. I smile when I think about holding a book in my hand with my name on the cover.

My friends Stayc and Joe motivate me every single day, so I have to give them a huge thank you. They push me to write even when I want to slack off.

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If the weather is nice out tomorrow we are going to take Sabrina to the park so she can play on the playground and she can have a picnic with mommy and daddy. I figure I can take my notebook and get a little work done out in the warmth and the sun while she plays. I'll have to take the camera and get some pictures as well.

Until then.

If thine eye offends thee, pluck it out.

Last night around 10 p.m. I started having pain in my right eye when I move it. I had this happen before in 2007. I went to the ER then and they told me it was eyestrain. The two days following my eye got progressively worse to the point that I was almost completely blind in that eye.

Out of curiosity, I of course turned to Google again. I found this: http://www.mult-sclerosis.org/opticneuritis.html

The picture at the top on the left is how my eye actually was in 2007. Then it of course got worse. My eye is no where near that bad right now but it scares me that it might go down that road again.

If my eye gets any worse in the slightest way, I am calling my doctor and demanding an MRI. I don't care if is shows anything or not, I need to have some peace of mind. Those creepy crawly sensations were bugging my nose earlier. The first time it freaked me out cause I thought a bug was on my face and going to crawl up my nose. CREEPY!

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Sabrina has had a cold for a couple of days but she finally seems to be on the mend. She still has a cough, and is still sleeping a lot, but she has more energy and her appetite is back. The only good part about her being sick is that she wants a lot of cuddle time. Nothing makes me happier than hugging and cuddling with my little girl.

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I had a nice conversation with my friend Cindy last night. She has always been like a big sister to me and she understands a lot of how I feel about things without me actually having to verbalize them. It was good to just talk to her and get a fresh take on things.

I can't, of course, leave out my friends Joe, Stayc, and Vicki. Joe is always ready with some funny comment or sick, twisted story (which he knows I love) in an attempt to cheer me up. Stayc is my witty Australian friend. She likes to do research for me and she reads my attempts at writing a novel. Her accent when she curses at people never fails to make me laugh. She sounds so bad ass. Vicki is one of my closest friends. She lets me vent to her and never tells me to shut up. She's also the one who introduced me to Bruce.

Part of why I started this blog is to be able to vent and get things off of my chest and not have to pile it all on Bruce or my friends. Part is to motivate myself to write every day. I hope it will kick start my second book. Part is just for me. Part is to maybe help someone else out there who may be going through the same things and know that they are not alone in the world.

Comments, good or bad, are always welcome.

More soon.

Limbo

I am in limbo and it's frustrating and maddening and annoying. It makes me angry and depressed. It makes it hard for me to find joy in the little things.

In the end of January/beginning of February, I noticed this weird numbness traveling from my right foot up to my right hip. It was very sensitive to the touch and if I put anything cold on the numb areas it felt like they were on fire. I assumed I had pinched a nerve until my vision started getting blurry. My first thought, since I am not the healthiest woman, is that it was probably diabetes. I figured if it was diabetes my sugar was so high it was affecting my nerves and my eyesight. I also had pretty horrible fatigue.

I made an appointment with one of the doctors in my primary care office. Dr. NH sent me for some blood work. I was tested for diabetes, thyroid, anemia, and abnormal blood counts. (I also had my coumadin level checked as I am on that for life but that is a different story.) No diabetes, no anemia, no abnormal blood count. My thyroid was slightly abnormal but she didn't feel it was anything to worry about and was going to do a recheck in 6 weeks. Since she told me not to worry about it, I didn't.

The fatigue got worse. Much worse. I could sleep a good six or seven hours, get out of bed, do some things around the house and if I sat down for longer than fifteen minutes I would fall right back asleep. Then the numbness in my hands started. Both hands are stiff, numb, occasionally tingly. I figured it was carpal tunnel syndrome.

March 2nd I went back to the doctor for a one month follow up. By this time my hands and forearms were numb. My entire torso from breasts to waist and around to my back were also numb. It feels almost like I spent a week wearing a shirt five sizes too small and just took it off. When I nod my head forward I get this weird shocking sensation across my lower back and the tops of my feet.

I saw Dr. SH this time. He was really nice and listened to all I had to say. I told him how I had Googled my symptoms and instead of telling me that I was dumb and I shouldn't do that, he said it was good that I was asking questions. I told him that I thought I had MS. He disagreed. He said that looking at my thyroid lab being slightly abnormal that he thought it was the thyroid causing my body to go all crazy. He said that he wanted to treat that first, and if need be, rule that out as a cause of my problems. Rather than go through a ton of expensive testing that might be useless, we were going to try thyroid medication. (Irregardless of anything else, my thyroid is screwed up and needs to be treated.)

The next day I started on Synthroid. The numbness at that point spread up the left side of my neck and behind my ear.

March 5: Numbness spread up both sides of my neck and the bottom edges of both ears.

March 7: Numbness spread down my neck into my shoulders. I can still lift my arms up but they both feel heavy.

March 14: Both ears are almost completely numb. Both sides of my face along my jawline are numb now too.

March 18: My right cheek is almost completely numb and the right corner of my mouth as well. My middle finger and ring finger of my right hand are more numb than usual.

I discovered that hot showers or hot water in general make my hands, arm, and facial numbness worse. They seem to go back to a normal level of numbness about a half hour after my shower.

Today I started feeling a sensation in my arm like I had laid it down on the desk and it was wet. It wasn't and neither was my arm. I keep getting a creepy crawly sensation on my legs like a bug is crawling on me. There is never a bug and it isn't constant.

Everything I keep reading points to MS. My doctor wants to give this medicine time to get fully in my system. As of today I have been on it three weeks and the medicine takes four to six weeks to get to a therapeutic level.

Not one of my symptoms have even slightly changed since starting this medication. This leaves me to believe that I really do have MS or something else.

I am so tired of being tired all the time. This not knowing for sure, not having a 100% sure diagnosis, is driving me crazy. It's making me angry, ultra-sensitive, more depressed. Dr. SH might have to up my happy pill dose. I cry a lot. Usually in the shower or when Bruce isn't home. I don't want him to see how scared and worried I am.

I just want to know once and for all what is wrong with me so I can get to the business of dealing with it. I am tired of being in limbo.